And the Deliverance and Restoration of the Remnant of Israel from the Seven Times, or 2520 years of Assyrian or Pagan and Papal Captivity considered.
BY H. EDSON.
(Continued)
It is in this American land that the great body of the Church has chiefly shared her glorious triumph and prosperity since 1798. It is here that the wilderness and the solitary place have been made glad for them, and the desert has rejoiced and blossomed as the rose.
It is here that the loud voice of preparation,170"Prepare ye the way of the Lord," &c., has been chiefly given. From this American land the Advent message has sounded forth to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. This land, and people are recognized by the name of Zion, and Jerusalem, [Isa. ii, 1–3; xi, 1, 9; Micah iv, 1, 2,] of whom it is written, [Micah iv, 2,] "The law shall go forth of Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." This is now being literally fulfilled in the proclamation of the Third Angel's Message, [Rev. xiv, 9–12,] advocating the perpetuity and obligation of God's ten moral precepts, the constitution and foundation of his moral government.
By consulting Eze. xxxviii, 8–12, we learn the fact that God's people in the closing scenes of the present dispensation are found dwelling in a land of unwalled villages, having neither bars nor gates, dwelling safely or confidently, (margin,) and that they are a people gathered out of the nations, and out of many people into a land that has always been desolate and waste, that is, an uncultivated, waste, howling wilderness, but is now inhabited by a people gathered out of the nations, and have gotten them goods, and cattle, and gold, and silver, &c. Please read Eze. xxxviii, 8–12.
We have reached the appointed time when the great body of God's living, professed people are to be found in such a land as above described; and there is no people or country on the habitable globe at this time that will answer the above description, but the people and country of this American land.
This American land so far as the ancient history of the world is concerned, has been always waste and desolate; an uncultivated, desolate, waste, howling WILDERNESS, unknown to the civilized world until the time of the promise drew nigh, when God was about to fulfill his word, and set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people from the land of their captivity, and bring them into the wilderness of preparation, &c. It was just in due time that God permitted this American continent to be discovered, and without doubt the Lord sent his angel to stir up the spirit of Columbus to engage in the enterprise, and guided his bark across the trackless deep to the discovery of this new world.
The dreadful and terrible beast, [Dan. vii, 7, 19,] which devoured, brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with his feet, thought also to cause this American land to feel his iron stamp; but in due time God removed his brazen hoof by bringing back these United States from the sword in the American revolution as predicted Eze. xxxviii, 8, and thus opened here just in due time an asylum of civil and religious liberty for the remnant of his people to be gathered into.
From the foregoing considerations we learn the important truth that God does literally gather the remnant of his people out of the countries wherein they have been scattered, and does literally bring them from the land of their captivity into a literal wilderness of woods, a place of preparation prior to their entering the land of Israel, the promised eternal inheritance of the earth made new.
It is after Jerusalem's appointed time which was accomplished A. D. 1798, that in the wilderness the voice of preparation is heard sounding. Read Isa. xi, 1–10. It is also since 1798 that steam engine power has been brought into use and applied in propelling rail-road cars. The prophet Nahum has foretold as recorded in chap. ii, 3, 4, that "the chariots shall be with flaming torches in the day of his PREPARATION. The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall jostle one against another in the broad ways; they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings."
We now behold these chariots streaming through the land in all directions; we hear their loud and shrill whistle, and their loud rolling thunder in the distance, and are thus admonished in thunder tones that the day of God's PREPARATION has arrived, and we are in the wilderness where the loud voice of his preparation is sounding, "Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a high-way for our God—and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together. Behold the Lord God will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him: behold his reward is with him, and his work before him." Read Isa. xi, 1–11.
Inasmuch as the remnant were to be gathered out of all places and countries wherein they were scattered, and were to be brought from the land of their captivity into the wilderness of preparation, the question arises, How much territory does the land of their captivity embrace? Answer: It embraces the ancient Assyrian or Babylonian, the Medo-Persian, the Grecian, and Roman empires: it embraces all territory over which the seven heads of Gentile rule have exercised their supremacy, the land of Canaan not excepted; hence we are driven entirely from the eastern continent to find the wilderness of preparation into which the remnant are gathered to prepare the way of the Lord, and make strait in the desert a highway for our God; and hence we are unavoidably confined to this American continent.
It is written [Dan. viii, 9] of the little horn (Rome) that "it waxed exceeding great toward the South, (Egypt,) and toward the East, (Palestine is in the East from Rome,) and toward the pleasant land." From the reading of this text, the pleasant land lies in a different point of compass from those named, and is necessarily located in the West, and must refer to the wilderness of preparation.
From the above it is clear that this wilderness of preparation is the pleasant land brought to view Dan. viii, 9. It is called in chap. xi, 41, 45, the glorious land, and the glorious holy mountain, or goodly land, land of delight or ornament, &c. See margin.
In Isa. xi, 11–16, we have the prophetic account of the Lord's setting his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people from the countries of their dispersion, and to gather and assemble them from the four corners of the earth, and the point of compass toward which they journey, in leaving the land of their captivity is expressly stated in verse 14 to be TOWARD THE WEST. It is also written [chap. lix, 19] "So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the West, and his glory from the rising of the sun." The glory of the coming of the Son of man will be as the lightning shining out of the East even unto the West. Matt. xxiv, 27. When the Lord shall roar like a lion, then the children shall tremble from the West. They shall tremble as a bird out of Egypt, and as a dove out of the land of Assyria. Hosea xi, 10, 11.
In the Roman empire the last end of Israel's captivity was accomplished; for the remnant to leave that land of their captivity and journey toward the West, there is no other alternative but for them to cross the broad Atlantic. Zech. x, predicts the departure of the scepter of spiritual Egypt, &c., in other words the taking away the dominion of the Pope 1798, and also the gathering of the remnant from the land of their captivity into Gilead and Lebanon; i. e., the wilderness of preparation to which the glory of Lebanon, &c., was given. He also testifies that they pass through the sea with affliction, and shall smite the waves of the sea; and Isa. lx, verse 9, reads, "Surely the isles shall wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first to bring thy sons from far, their silver and their gold with them, unto the name of the Lord thy God, &c. For the remnant to leave the Roman empire and journey toward the West, and pass through or across the sea, would bring them to this American continent. This very plain truth must be visible to all.
This gathering of the remnant from the land of their captivity is accomplished by lifting up an ensign for the nations, and by blowing a trumpet for the assembling of the outcasts of Israel. Compare Isa. xi, 11, 12; xviii, 3, 7.